The photo of the one tree really speaks to me. But you won’t read what I’m about to say inside any Christmas card. This one is just for you…from me…right now, right here.

You’ve seen it in my face. I am tired. I am weary of being on the wrong end of Hatred. I am exhausted at the energy required to shake my fist at injustice. I bristle when I see organized efforts to crush hope in anyone who dares look up. I miss my friends now dead and family that may as well be. I am so tired of working in the fields where harvest never seems to come. Just last week, I overheard an ignorant conversation referring to me as “the gay guy”. In 2014? Where is my America?

I have a name.

I want to hate them. I want to see them fall. I want to deal with bigots and militarized authority in the same way they chose to deal with me and those like me.

But just about the moment I was ready to write off Christmas as a cruel joke and surrender to the worst thoughts in me, two things sought me out:

The first thing?

It was realizing the Season is not mine. Nor is it about Christians or Jews, Hindus or Muslim. It is about love – one for another. What brought it into focus was reading about a grass root movement in Australia last week [http://www.bbc.com/news/blogs-trending-30479306] where everyday people spontaneously embraced their Muslim neighbors who were afraid of an anti-Islamic backlash in the aftermath of that coffee shop attack by saying, “I’ll ride with you”. Hash tag or not, the movement took off…Why?

Most of us regular people have about had it up to here with Fear and Darkness. Pay attention ye poachers of all that is Good in us. We claim ‘Peach on Earth, Good Will’ back as our own. We are not alone. Seems neither one of us is not so alone after all. In that, I am renewed by you. As Dr. King so aptly said, “Darkness cannot drive out darkness; only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate; only love can do that.”

And the second thing?

Not nearly as simple as I sometimes claim to be, but yearning to be, this simple song found me and now I share it with you here. As I offer myself to you all year long, I offer another sort of gift to you now. I’d like to think she would approve.

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About dan4kent

Born and raised in the Midwest, Dan lives in the Chicagoland area. With a grown son from a previous marriage, he has since built a committed relationship of 34 years with his partner Rick, the Love of his Life. Having written his whole life, he blogged the past 7-years because he has to write…he can’t help it. Know the feeling? There’s ‘good‘ to be found in all of it.
“If all I do is leave someone (or something) better than I found them, then I’ve done my part. Thanks for letting me grace your screen, if only for a little while.”

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